Hi all,

I have a dell inspiron 6000.

i am trying to make debian etch detect my cddrive. So, I am installing again and again (of course with some changes in boot params).

Now, I installed with instal24 (kernel 2.4) and during installation it detected my cddrive. During installation, I make a mistake of selecting Desktop Environment (i wanted only basic system). By default it installed Gnome.

After booting, I get the message "starting gdm ..." and after that just a blank screen. With the knoppix cd, I could see in /etc/inittab that the default runlevel was 2 (i think that means without gui) and I even changed it to 1. Still I get the same problem.

Why is it trying to boot to Gui even if the runlevel is 1 or 2 ?

Is there anyway to correct this problem without reinstalling ?


thanks,
Hardik

In Debian the configuration of services for each runlevel is left for the system administrator. Runlevel S starts necessary system services, runlevel 0 halts the system, runlevel 1 is for single-user mode, runlevels 2-5 are for multi-user mode, runlevel 6 reboots the system. See "man init" for more info.

When you get the blank screen, you should be able to switch to another virtual terminal using the key combination "Ctrl-Alt-F2". Problems with starting the X Window System are logged in /var/log/Xorg.0.log. The command "cat /var/log/Xorg.0.log | grep EE" lists any critical errors, so you'll know what should be changed in your X configuration. You can reconfigure the X server by typing "su" to become root and then "dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xorg".

I already tried this, but not working. I fear, something else is also wrong. During booting I see one message that udev has failed ! Has this something to do ?

Even with default runlevel 1 (single user) it tries to start gdm (i guess it is login manager for Gnome). Is this normal ?

thanks,
Hardik

But you saw the "starting gdm ..." message and this is usually the very last service that is started. So the blank screen probably indicates that X has failed to start. Studying the Xorg.0.log file is likely to give you the answer what's wrong with your X configuration.

If "Ctrl-Alt-F2" fails, you can always study your Debian installation from Knoppix. Find out where Knoppix sets the mout point for your Debian partition, mount it and chroot into it. For example, if Debian is installed onto /dev/hda1 and Knoppix sets its mount point to /media/hda1, you can do "sudo mount /media/hda1" and "sudo chroot /media/hda1". After that, you should find yourself as the root user in your mounted Debian partition.

Then you can type "mc" to start the Midnight Commander filemanager that will help you to browse, read and edit files. You can view /var/log/Xorg.0.log and you can change the symlink S99gdm in /etc/rc2.d/ (and maybe also in /etc/rc1.d/) to K99gdm. This should tell Debian NOT to try to start gdm during boot, so Debian should just boot to command prompt, making it easier to study & configure your Debian installation the normal way. After you've reconfigured X, you can change /etc/rc2.d/K99gdm back to S99gdm (/etc/rc1.d/ doesn't need S99gdm, I agree with you on this issue). Of course, you can also run "dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xorg" from your chroot'ed Debian partition in Knoppix.

Udev failing to start is not good news, of course, but I don't think it's actually critical for starting Debian. I still think that your main problem for now is getting X correctly configured. I don't have any suggestions for solving the udev problem at this time. Maybe "aptitude update && aptitude dist-upgrade" will fix it?

EDIT:
Come to think of it, it's probably easier just to re-install Debian according to your original plan: without choosing Desktop Environment. It's easy enough to install x-window-system and other stuff afterwards. If you manage to install Debian with 2.6 kernel, this is likely to solve the udev problem. Or, if 2.4 is the only kernel that works for you, you might want to consider xfce4 desktop (or a window manager like fluxbox, wmaker or icewm) instead of gnome or kde. This way you don't necessarily need udev at all.

have you actually checked to see if x-windw-system and xserver-xorg have been isntalled. I recently did an installation of etch and had dektop enviroment selected. It downloded and nsalled gnome and gdm but it never actually downloaded x-window-system or x-server-xorg i had to apt-get these my self. This could be the problem

Have you tried to change the x-server driver from ati to vesa in XF86Config-4 or xorg.conf?

Hi Guys,

thanks.

I used knoppix cd to delete the link S99gdm , and could start without gui.

I have mentioned the details here.

http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...d.php?t=434714


Hardik